Arrow's Creed
by Zivon96
Summary: Just as it seems the Arrow has been pardoned for his actions in the past, bodies begin to drop. The evidence all points to a new vigilante in Starling whose tactics resemble those of the League of Assassins. As the Arrow begins to investigate these killings, it leads him down a path of secrets and conspiracies all centered around an ancient war between two ancient orders.
1. Chapter 1

The Starling City docks were seldom a welcoming place, and even less so tonight. A company of about a dozen armed men, each one carrying an M4 rifle patrolled a small, dockside warehouse, the arms they carried, along with the symbols on the uniforms they wore warning anyone who would approach of the fatal mistake they would soon be making. Each man bore a crest on his sleeve, a stylized triangle with the word "Abstergo" beneath it.

The sound of footsteps caught the attention of one guard, the man signalling to his fellows as they all raised their weapons as one. "Who's there?" He demanded.

"Relax, gentlemen." Said a smooth voice. "The company sent me to have a look at the package." The speaker was revealed to be a tall, thin man in a pristine black suit with short, cropped black hair and blue eyes, a small, seemingly permanent smirk on his face as he approached the guards. "I trust no one else has seen it yet?"

"Not yet sir." The head guard said, coming forward and saluting the man in the suit. "We were waiting for a company representative before we opened the doors. If you don't mind though, sir, I'm going to need to see some ID."

"Oh, but of course." The suited man said, reaching into his pocket. The guard's hands tightened around his rifle. He knew this city was famous for vigilante activity, so for all he knew, this man was a killer. He relaxed, however, upon seeing that the man had simply pulled out an ID card identifying him as Jacob Ellison of Abstergo Industries. "I trust this is good enough?"

The guard loosened his grip on his gun and gestured to the warehouse. "Right this way, Mister Ellison."

Ellison followed the guard toward the warehouse, nodding to the two guards by the door as the others watched them pass before returning to their patrols. "Tell me, captain, is this the only way in?"

"No, sir." The guard said. "There's a back door as well, and I have three men on it."

"Good." Ellison said smoothly, opening the door to the warehouse. "I'd hate for us to be interrupted. Abstergo put a lot of money into finding this back in Italy."

"If you don't mind me asking, sir," the guard inquired. "What exactly is this thing? We were never told what we were guarding."

"That's because you didn't need to know." Ellison said, stepping into the warehouse. "Though I'll ask you to come with me for now. It would be nice to have just a bit of extra protection."

The guard saluted. "Yes sir." He said, following Ellison inside.

Once the door was shut and locked, Ellison took a long look around the warehouse. The guard captain may have been with him, and he may have said the doors were locked and watched, but in a profession like his, one could never be too careful. The warehouse was dimly lit, and what space there was in the small building was taken up by stacks of crates. In the middle of the building, however, was a small, metal table with a briefcase on top. Ellison stepped toward the case and reached into his pocket, producing a small silver key. When he reached the briefcase, he used the key to unlock the locks on the case and opened it.

A set of lights built into the case turned on to illuminate its contents. Sitting in a sealed glass case inside the briefcase was a series of partially burned papers, each one browned from age, charred around the edges and having the odd hole in it. Next to the glass compartment was a keypad, a password being required to open the glass. Ellison's smirk grew only wider. "My good man, you were told nothing about what it is you were guarding, correct?"

"Yes sir, that's correct." The guard replied.

"There's a good reason for that." Ellison said. "You see, the contents of this briefcase are of unimaginable value. You see, this is a piece of history here. These pages are the last surviving fragments of the Codex of Altair. The pieces were once thought destroyed in the Battle of Monteriggioni over five hundred years ago. The fact that we now possess them... I'll need to get these to the director and quickly."

The guard nodded and took a step towards the door, but stopped in his tracks almost immediately. "Sir, get behind me. I think someone's in here with us."

"I thought you said no one could get in!" Ellison hissed, slamming the case shut and shoving the key in his jacket pocket.

"It seems we have an uninvited guest." The guard said, grabbing his radio. "Men, we have a party crasher. No one leaves unless I say so."

" _Ten four sir."_ Came the response.

The guard raised his weapon and looked around the room with a keen eye. "Come out now and make this easy." He said.

No response.

"Come out now or I'll shoot!" He said, louder this time.

Still no answer.

Tightening the grip on his gun, the guard turned back to Ellison. "Sir, stay close to me. We'll take the front door out and my men can search the building."

Ellison nodded and stepped closer to the guard. The two of them began slowly moving towards the front door, Ellison's heart beating faster as the guard tightened his grip on his gun.

Before either one could move any further, the lights went out. Ellison took in breath through his teeth, the guard immediately looking behind them.

No one was there.

Looking around the room, it seemed completely devoid of life other than them, the only sound being both of their breathing. The guard's eyes scanned the room, his trigger finger itching as he waited for someone to appear. He knew there was someone else here. He could feel it.

He wasn't wrong.

The faint sound of a released bowstring echoed in the small building as an arrow flew out of the shadows above them, the projectile puncturing the guard's rifle. Before either of them could move, a shape burst from the shadows, leaping off one of the stacks of crates and landing right in front of the guard. Before he could call for help, the figure hooked him in the jaw and slammed his forearm into the top of his head, a metallic 'clang' ringing out before the guard dropped to the ground.

Ellison turned to make a break for the door, but before he could even move, the attacker was on him, throwing him to the ground and driving a blade into his neck.

Ellison looked up as the life left his body. His killer stood above him, dressed in a white, hooded robe, the details lost on him through the darkened building's shadows and his own vision darkening. "I know what you are." He croaked "Your crusade will not succeed. We hold more power than you could ever imagine."

The killer slowly knelt down and placed a hand on Ellison's eyelids, the Abstergo employee letting the darkness take him as the assassin closed his eyes.

 _ **Arrow's Creed**_

 _ **Chapter 1**_

When Quentin Lance was called down to a crime scene that morning, he should have known there was a reason for it.

Thanks to his... condition... the other members of the SCPD rarely let him leave the station, and now with his daughter telling him not to aid in the... nightly activities of the Arrow anymore, life had become considerably more boring. So, when he was called down to the scene of a break-in and homicide, it definitely sounded like there was more to the story than they were letting on.

As he drove onto the scene in his cruiser, he stepped out into the sunlight of the city docks. Several officers were surrounding a single warehouse, but as he flashed his badge to them, they allowed him to pass. As he walked past the police line, he saw a detective taking a statement from three men in security uniforms by the warehouse door. "Detective," Lance greeted. "What's going on?"

"Captain Lance." The detective said, gesturing to the three men. "These men were assaulted last night. They didn't see by who, but each one was knocked out before they could radio for help."

Lance walked over to the three guards and looked each one in turn. "None of you saw anything?"

The guards looked defiant under Lance's eye, but not one of them spoke. To the trained eye of the police captain, they were hiding something. "Detective, explain to these two fine gents what and obstruction charge is and then see if they want to start talking. I'm needed inside." With that, Lance walked into the warehouse. Inside, it was surprisingly clean, to the point that if it weren't for the assaulted guards outside, one would never have guessed a robbery had taken place.

That all changed, however, when he stumbled onto the real crime scene. A covered body lay on the floor, a discarded rifle a short distance away. "What happened here, and why did you call me?" Lance asked the detective on scene. The detective was a short, African American man with his hair cropped short wearing a blazer. Two officers were also on scene, examining the rifle and marking it. "We've got a break in and homicide, but I don't see why you needed to drag me out here."

"It was my idea to call you, sir."Said the detective. "With all the work you put into the Arrow-"

"We already pardoned him." Lance said "And a random break in and homicide just isn't his style... not anymore at least."

"I know that," The detective continued. "But with the amount of work you out into that case, I figured you're kind of used to, shall we say, odd cases."

"Odd? What do you mean odd? Some guy broke in and killed him, what makes this odd?"

"Well, for one, a guard that was in here with him survived." The detective said. "The man was knocked out cold by the attacker who then proceeded to kill this man, a mister Jacob Ellison." The detective explained.

"Alright, that's a bit odd," Lance agreed. "But was it really worth dragging me out here for? I'm not exactly in the best shape of my life."

"It does get stranger." The detective continued. "That rifle over there, that's not the murder weapon. That was the guard's gun. And look at the body." He said, pulling the cover off Jacob Ellison's body and revealing him to Lance.

The police captain frowned as he looked over the corpse. "It almost looks like he's sleeping." He muttered.

"Exactly." The detective explained. "He was killed quickly and efficiently, one shot right to the neck. Then our killer gets all artsy with him, puts his hands on his chest and closes his eyes."

"Looks like we might have a psycho on our hands." Lance surmised as he looked at the body, the desire to try and wake him up only alleviated by the puncture wound in his neck.

"I thought so too," The detective said "Until I got a look at the gun. We found this in it." He said, producing a small evidence bag. Inside the bag was a single object. "It's an arrow, Captain Lance. The killer shot the gun with an arrow."

Lance took the bag and looked over its contents. Not even a year ago he would have been ecstatic about a development like this. After all, it would bring him another step closer to finding the vigilante that so troubled him. Today, however, he and said vigilante had an unsteady peace, and Lance had even issued a formal pardon to him. He had a feeling that this wasn't the Arrow, and the evidence he held in his hand confirmed that suspicion. "It's not him."

"What?"

"It's not him, this isn't one of his arrows." Lance said, gesturing to the evidence bag. "For one, this isn't an arrow, it's a bolt. This guy had a crossbow, not a bow and arrow. Second, the Arrow doesn't use this kind of ammo. He uses these fancy carbon fibre green headed arrows, whereas this is a wooden bolt with a metal tip, completely different unless he's gotten a major downgrade."

"So you're saying we have another copycat archer?" The detective asked.

"No, I'm saying we have a new vigilante." Lance mused. "Maybe someone took my pardoning the Arrow to mean it's legal now."

The detective looked like he was about to say more when the door to the warehouse burst open, a woman in a grey suit with short brown hair and brown eyes strode in, flanked by two security guards in identical uniforms to the guards outside. "Officers, I'm going to have to ask you to leave." The woman said, her voice crisp and impatient. "This is an internal Abstergo matter, and we will be taking over the investigation from here."

"I'm sorry miss, who are you?" The detective asked.

"Laetitia England," The woman said. "Abstergo board of directors."

"Uh, hi, I'm Captain Quentin Lance, SCPD." Lance said, stepping between Laetitia and the detective. "We do this kind of work for a living, so I can assure you that we'll be able to handle this."

Laetitia rolled her eyes. "Captain Lance, Abstergo's private business is our affair, so while you may feel free to investigate the murder, you will not be given access to any of our company information or records, understood?"

Lance cocked his head at the woman. "Uh, lady, I don't think you know this, but you're supposed to help the police investigate the murder of one of your employees, not cover it up. Oh, and also, when you deny access to pretty much anything that might be important about this poor man, it makes you look a hell of a lot more suspicious than anyone else right now. So I suggest that you let me have a look at a few files on mister Ellison."

Many people would have been intimidated by the speech that Lance had just given. Laetitia England, however, was not one of those people. "I suggest you speak with Abstergo's legal team then. Now, if you don't mind, I have a question for you, detective Lance."

"Oh, you do now." Lance said in disbelief. "You come in here, disrupt our investigation and then refuse to give us any information, and then you start asking me questions?"

"We need to determine if anything of value was stolen." Laetitia continued, undaunted, raising her voice slightly with every word. "There are a few things that may have gone missing from this warehouse, and I would be willing to pay good money to anyone willing to go over a small list of items and tell me if any have been found here."

That did it. Several heads around the room spun in her direction. Lance applied palm to face. "This is ridiculous. Fine, find out what was stolen and then report back to us with it. If we know what it is you're looking for, it'll make this case a lot easier."

Laetitia looked at Lance quizzically. "I'm sorry detective, you must be under the impression that Abstergo is willing to play well with others. We don't. If there's something we feel you need to know, you will be told. Until then, stay out of our way."

With that, Laetitia turned on her heel and walked off. The detective turned to face Captain Lance. "What do we do now, sir?"

Lance rubbed his temples in frustration. "Keep up the investigation until they throw you out. I've got a phone call to make."

Suffice it to say, Felicity Smoak was more than a bit surprised to hear her phone ringing with a call from Detective – sorry – Captain Lance this early in the day, especially since the man rarely called her unless it had something to do with the man she spent her nights with... not in that way... but still, a call from him in broad daylight was a bit surprising... and now she was making it sound like some kind of crime. Maybe she should just answer the phone. "Detective Lance?" And there she went again with the 'detective' Lance...

" _Felicity, listen, I need your help."_ Lance said _"Is our mutual friend there?"_

Since Felicity just so happened to be helping Oliver prepare to get his company back, he just happened to be sitting just across from her. The former playboy and current vigilante looked her in the eye as she mouthed the word _'Lance'_ to him. A single nod told her he would take the call, and she quickly handed the phone over to him.

Oliver took the phone and activated its built in voice modulator. "Captain Lance?" He said, his voice coming out much deeper on the other end.

" _We may have a problem."_ Said the captain. _"There's another vigilante in town. He's got a crossbow, and he's a bit too reminiscent of you in your old days than I'm comfortable with."_

"He's a killer?" Oliver asked, somewhat dreading the answer. The last thing he needed was for another vigilante to think that just because he had killed once meant it was fine to leave a trail of bodies.

" _Afraid so."_ Lance replied. _"He dropped a body at the docks last night, fought off all the guards and put a knife in his throat. Strange thing is, all the guards were still alive to talk about it, it's just the one guy that got killed."_

Oliver frowned. Why would a vigilante killer do something like that? When he was still in his time as a killer, the majority of bodies he dropped were henchmen of the people he hunted, killed because they would likely kill him if he didn't. This guy, on the other hand... why would he only kill the one man. "Send Felicity as much as you can on the victim, including how he was killed. I'll track this guy down."

" _Thanks. See if Felicity can't track down any more info on this guy than I could, his company's giving me the cold shoulder."_

"Will do, Captain." With those words, Oliver disconnected the call and handed the phone back to Felicity. "We've got a problem. Another vigilante killer is out there, he's already struck once, and I want him stopped before he does again."

"What about Stillgrave's crew?" Felicity asked.

Oliver cursed under his breath. He'd been tracking that crew for weeks now. "We'll get Roy to keep an eye on them. Find out what you can about this guy, and I'll work with that to track down his killer."

 **And that is chapter one of this new project**

 **Just to clarify, this story begins at the start of Season 3 of Arrow, because that's not only when the plot involving the League of Assassins really begins, but it's also when the Flash begins.**

 **I should probably say right now that this is somewhat of a collaborative project with fellow author Undaed15 who will be working on the Flash story to this Arrow piece. And just a warning, there will be appearances in this story, and likely also in his, from characters from other franchises. Not too many, but some will appear.**


	2. Chapter 2

Felicity Smoak was not having a good day. And now that she thought about it, last night sucked even more.

Oh, it had started out well enough, with Oliver actually asking her out, holy crap that actually happened to her, but had quickly gotten worse when the dinner they went out to was... interrupted. Some whack job had fired an RPG, a freaking rocket powered grenade launcher, at the restaurant! The place went up in smoke and the date was completely ruined. Hard to believe things could get worse, but Murphy's Law was a cruel truth, and things just got worse as Oliver called Lance and suited up to take down said nutcase.

It didn't go well. Oliver found out that the lunatic in question was one Werner Zytle, a man who had taken up the mantle of "Vertigo" after the death of the Count last year. The fight between them ended with Oliver hopped up on his new Vertigo, and Detective – sorry, CAPTAIN Lance in the hospital due to his heart problems. In other words, it sucked for everyone.

Then the morning came, and with it, Oliver's chance to win back Queen Consolidated after that bitch Rochev stole it last year. Unfortunately, all her training and Oliver's passion for his company was undone by what seemed to be Felicity's biggest mistake of the year. At her current job, the soul crushing exercise in misery that offered health and dental at Tech Village, she had given hacking advice to a customer, one who showed up this morning, calling himself Ray Palmer, only to reveal that he had used the advice she had given him to hack into Queen Consolidated records and find out about Oliver's less than stellar record as head of the company. Okay, that was a low blow. How was Oliver supposed to run both the company and his crusade at once? Then again, that Ray Palmer guy probably didn't know about Oliver being The Arrow... Unless he found out about that in his hack... but then again, that wasn't on QC records so he probably couldn't have found it. She hoped.

Anyway, at least the night was a bit better. Oliver beat the tar out of Zytle, Roy saved an entire stadium full of people Zytle was trying to blow up, and Sara came back to visit. Sure she was probably here for some creepy League of Assassins mission, but at least she was here.

And to top it all off, John and Lyla finally had their first child! An adorable baby girl, she was so cute... but then something happened that ruined the night for her.

After the... incident at the restaurant, she knew that her chances with Oliver were in danger, and tonight, Oliver decided to end it, stating that right now he couldn't be both The Arrow and Oliver Queen at the same time, and that the city needed The Arrow more than he wanted to be Oliver Queen. With Oliver deciding to end their budding relationship now before someone could get hurt, Felicity had begged him that if he was going to end it to admit that he had never loved her and that he had lied. The kiss Oliver gave her that interrupted her told her otherwise. Not able to take anymore, Felicity had taken the chance to make her escape, leaving the hospital where she had visited John and Lyla after they had their daughter, Felicity ran to her car. She unlocked the door, climbed inside and gripped the wheel tightly as she let out a heavy sigh. Maybe they just weren't meant to be.

She was about to continue feeling sorry for herself when her phone rang, her familiar ringtone making her jump. She picked up her cell phone and looked at the caller ID screen. There was no name given, but the number was displayed. Figuring if it was a prank call she could trace it and give the unfortunate prankster a nice little present on their phone, she answered. "Hello?"

" _Hey,"_ Said a young and carefree sounding woman on the other end. _"This is Felicity Smoak, right?"_

"Possibly. I mean, it might be, but that all depends on who's on the other end of this call. I mean, you could be anyone and I'd never know, you could even be disguising your voice and... Okay, I kind of just gave myself away, didn't I?"

The woman on the other end laughed. _"You never did lose that speech thing of yours, did you?"_

Now Felicity was starting to get confused. "What do you mean? Look, if this is some kind of prank, I swear I'll-"

" _Who, relax girl, you don't recognize my voice?"_ The woman said. _"It's Rebecca Crane from college!"_

"Rebecca?" Felicity repeated. "I thought you were in Italy."

" _I got back stateside just recently."_ Rebecca replied. _"I'm actually in Starling for a bit, I think you said you were living there?"_

"Uh, yeah, I'm still here."

" _Awesome! We should totally meet up some time! Are you free tomorrow?"_

Felicity took a moment to think about what she was doing. Sure, she remembered Rebecca from high school, she rarely forgot anything, especially good friends, but it had been a long time since she had even seen Rebecca, let alone spoken to her. She remembered Rebecca as one of her few Goth friends back when she was... going through that phase, God that was an embarrassing time of her life... anyway, she knew that she had natural black hair and a love for all things music and tech, but that was about all she remembered about her. She had mentioned a vacation in Italy, but that was the last she'd heard of her.

" _Felicity, you there?"_

"What?"

" _I asked if you could meet me tomorrow, can you?"_

"Uh, sure, I guess, but you're telling me about that trip of yours, I mean I haven't seen you in, like, eight years and-"

" _Who, girl, don't go a mile a minute on me here. I'll meet you at your work when you get off your shift. We'll hit a bar, grab a couple drinks and swap stories. What do you say?"_

"Alright, I'll text you the address where I work. See you when my shift ends." With that, Felicity ended the call.

On the other end of the call, Rebecca slipped her phone back in her pocket and sighed in satisfaction. "See Shaun, I told you it would work." The girl hadn't changed much in appearance since high school, being taller and having ditched the Goth outfit... God that had been embarrassing. She still had black hair down to the base of her neck and had headphones around her neck. She had a slightly thin face, her hair hanging down over her forehead, ending just above her blue eyes. She was dressed in khaki pants a white shirt and a brown vest over it.

Her colleague just scoffed and gripped the wheel of the van they sat in. "How do you know so many people?" He wondered aloud, his British accent showing. He was a tall man with light brown hair that had been cut short and a pair of nerdy glasses on. He wore a pair of khaki pants like his partner, his being slightly baggier while hers were skin tight, and a white button-up shirt under a pale blue sweater. "Seriously, we get sent to a completely random city in the states and you somehow know someone who lives here?"

"I have these things called friends, you should try making a few." Rebecca shot back. "Now start driving, the safehouse we've been given is like a twenty minute drive from here."

"The GPS says it's only five." Shaun replied, haughtily. "And, you'll find I do, in fact, have friends."

Rebecca scoffed and put her feet up on the dashboard. "Yeah, just not as many as me. Now drive. Someone has to investigate that Abstergo killing, and the big shots say it's going to be us."

"What big shots there are left." Shaun muttered as he started up the van. "We're getting smaller every year."

"God, you are so depressing." Rebecca groaned as the van started up and drove into the darkened city.

 _ **Arrow's Creed**_

 _ **Chapter 2**_

Sara Lance, AKA the Canary, pulled herself up into her old clocktower residence. She had no intention of staying here for long, especially tonight since she had plans to meet with her sister later and possibly her father, but also in general since she would be staying at a League safehouse as soon as she was told where it would be. She had just come back for now to see if she had left anything behind and to visit a few friends she had made in the Glades, namely Sin. However, when she entered the room atop the tower, something immediately felt... off. It was something that she had gotten used to in her time with the league, something that only put her on edge because she had done it to so many people before now.

She was being watched.

Drawing her collapsible staff and extending it to its full size, the Canary stood in a battle ready stance. "I know you're here." She said to the darkness, voice modulated, eyes narrowed and all other senses at the ready. "Make this easy and come out and face me."

The room remained silent for several moments, but to Sara, it could have been years. The sounds of the city outside could still be heard, but she only paid attention to the sounds inside the clocktower, her own heartbeat and breathing echoing off the walls.

Her waiting would soon end, but not as she expected it to.

The Canary had planned for an attack, for an enemy to appear out of the darkness or for a gun to be cocked, but rather than all of that, her intruder simply dropped from above, landing only a few feet in front of her in a crouch. As the intruder got to their feet, Sara took in their appearance. He was a man, though the only feature of his face visible was his mouth and chin, the upper half of his face shrouded in shadows from a white hood. That white hood was the headpiece to his costume which was a white hooded robe that went from his head down to just beneath his knees in the back, though exposed his legs in the front, likely as not to get caught on them while he ran. He had on a pair of metal bracers on his arms with some sort of complex mechanism on the bottoms of each wrist, and he also wore a cape over his left shoulder, the outside of which was brown, and the inside red. His pants were black, and he wore a pair of knee high brown leather boots. However, his outfit wasn't what caught Sara's eye. No, what the Canary noticed was the fact that her intruder was armed to the teeth.

At his belt, a belt that was fastened with what looked like a stylized letter 'A,' she instantly noticed that he held a dagger with a wide blade as well as a basket hilted broadsword and several smaller knives, throwing knives most likely, and across his back was what appeared to be a wooden crossbow. "So, you come here often?" Sara asked, staff at the ready.

The stranger said nothing, merely smiling under his hood.

"You know it's rude to show up at a lady's house unannounced. Maybe you should call next time."

Still silence.

Canary and her opponent began to circle each other, neither one seeming to want to make the first move. Eventually, after what felt like an eternity of silent circling, Sara struck first, throwing her sonic screamer on the ground on front of her opponent, sending him stumbling back, holding his head in pain. Sara took her chance to strike, smashing her staff into the intruder and knocking him back into the stairwell to the tower, the white hooded intruder falling down the steps into the lower levels of the clocktower. Sara scooped up her sonic weapon and followed him down to the lower landing, bringing her staff down in an overhead swing at her foe, only for him to catch it, shooting both arms up in an 'X' and catching the staff between his bracers, grabbing it in his left hand and shooting his right hand forward in a strike. Sara's keen hearing was the only thing that saved her as she was able to hear the 'click' of the mechanism in his bracer in time to dodge the blade that emerged that would have stabbed her otherwise.

Sara juked out of the way of the intruder's strike and kicked him in the chest, sending him stumbling back and making him release her staff. Once again, Canary readied her weapon, but this time, the hooded man drew his sword. And held it in a fighting stance. He struck first this time, lunging forward with a stab from his sword and getting in close to Sara. The Canary managed to block his attack, but with the shorter weapon, the intruder was able to continuously strike at her, and all she could do was dodge or block as she had little room to swing her staff. Finally, after one strike from his sword, Sara used the end of her staff to sweep the intruder's legs out from underneath him and send him to the ground where she levelled the end of her staff at his neck. "Give up now, and this goes no further."

The intruder merely smiled under his hood. "I think not, _bella."_ He replied before pulling something out of a hidden pouch on his belt. Throwing it to the ground, it exploded into a cloud of smoke that blinded Sara and caused her to erupt into a coughing fit. Though through her coughs she could hear the intruder getting back to his feet, that hearing saving her again as she brought up her staff to block his sword as it swung at her. It occurred to her at that point that his fighting style seemed... familiar. Why was it?

That was when it hit her. He fought like a member of the league.

As the smoke began to clear, Sara's mind became more clouded. Who was this man? Did Ra's send him? What was he doing here? That's when something else hit her. He had spoken with an accent when he was on the ground, Italian if she was correct. "Who are you?" She asked.

He smirked under his hood again. "Isn't it polite to introduce yourself first?"

Sara narrowed her eyes. "I am _Ta-er al Safar."_

The man let out a scoff. "Your name is 'The Canary?' I was under the impression that parents didn't name their children after animals."

"You should know where our names come from if you are one of us."

That seemed to confuse the intruder, his smile faltering. Sara took this as her chance to strike, spinning her staff around her body and slamming it into his chest, knocking him to the ground. As she levelled her staff at his neck again, she said "Not a move. You reach for another smoke bomb and I'll show you pain."

The intruder merely raised his hands and nodded.

"Who are you?" The Canary demanded. "Why were you here?"

"You may call me _Il_ _Profeto_ _,_ and as for why I was here, I have been here long before tonight, my dear bird." The intruder replied.

Sara thought about the name he had called himself. The Prophet. What could that mean? What was he supposedly prophesising? After all of that, only one question really lingered in her mind. "What do you mean you've been here long before me? How long, and what are you here for?"

"It is hard to find, how you say, good housing in this city. As for how long, I'd say maybe a month. I did just recently get into town, and it's hard for a man dressed as myself to find friends."

"You still haven't answered my question."

"No I haven't, little bird."

"Little bird? You don't look that much bigger than me, or older for that matter."

The intruder's smile remained as he chuckled in spite of the weapon at his neck. "I have been alive for a long time, Canary."

Sara narrowed her eyes at him. He certainly looked about the same age as her, what could he have meant by that? "Who sent you here?"

"No one you would know." He said. "And I hope you never have to meet them."

"And why are you here?"

"There are certain people in this city who need to be reminded that the world is not simply theirs for the taking. I am here to remind them of that."

"Has anyone told you you're very cryptic?"

"I'm usually much more sociable, just not with a weapon pointed at my throat."

Sara locked eyes with the intruder. "If I let you up, will you try anything?"

The Prophet shook his head, an action just visible under his hood.

"I'll kill you if you do." The Canary warned as she removed her staff from his neck, though she did not holster it. The hooded intruder rose to his feet and sheathed his sword, a pointless gesture, as Sara knew he had knives on his bracers, and likely a lot more weapons he could easily draw and attack with. "So, who are these people who need a reminder?"

The Prophet looked down grimly and clenched a fist. "Today, they are known as Absergo Industries, one of the biggest corporations on the planet. Long ago, however, they were known by another name." Sara was about to ask what he meant by that, when the alarm on her watch went off. She was supposed to meet Laurel in twenty minutes! She had completely forgotten in all the excitement. "Is something the matter, Little Bird?"

"I need to meet someone. Look, we can talk more after my meeting." Sara replied. She neglected to mention that she had a sneaking suspicion that the person she was in town searching for might also be interesting to this 'Prophet.' After all, Merlyn Global did have ties to Abstergo Industries before it collapsed.

oxoxoxo

Laetitia England sighed with annoyance as she sat in the back of her idle limousine outside a wine tasting, a glass of fine red wine in hand. Those idiots down at the SCPD were still refusing to cooperate, so her investigators were having a tougher time finding out more about the incident at the docks. She had her teams take inventory of the items in the warehouse and it confirmed just what she had feared: The Codex had been stolen, meaning the perpetrators were likely exactly who she thought they were. No matter how few they were, and no matter how many of their men her organization put down, somehow those damned Assassins still managed to remain a thorn in her side.

She downed the contents of her wine glass and placed the empty goblet into the container next to her seat before calling for her driver. "Get me back to Abstergo's HQ. I need to look over the autopsy report on the Ellison." The SCPD may not have been willing to cooperate, but her organization had its fingers in a lot of pockets, including the city morgue, a useful place to have those fingers since she had a sneaking suspicion about how she could prove who was behind the murder.

Little did she know that her call had been heard.

As her limo pulled away from the tasting, she missed the man who had stood not twenty feet from her car, dressed in a brown trenchcoat and a black baseball cap, and completely missed as he slipped his smartphone back into his pocket, the same phone he had used to hack into Laetitia's driver's phone and turn it into a listening device. These big business types, they knew better than to let their own phones go unsecured, but chose to completely ignore their peons most of the time. So she had a suspicion about the murder of her crony but was choosing to hide it from the police. Only more evidence that Abstergo was hiding something. He still had a long way to go before he had the information on them he was looking for, but with them so focused on catching this killer, they'd never even know he was there, let alone catch him.

After all, you can't catch a Digital Shadow.

oxoxoxo

Laurel Lance smiled widely as she walked toward her car. There was truly no better end to a good night. A bomb plot was stopped by Oliver and her sister Sara, she had just talked to her sister, something she scarcely got to do since she was a member of the League of Assassins, and now she was off to make sure the psycho who tried to blow up an arena full of people to kill three men would be put away. Not only that, but from a phone call she had gotten from Felicity earlier, Diggle and Lyla now had their first child, a bouncing baby girl. This was a great night.

She was almost to her car, when a noise from above her caught her attention. It was the sound of a scuffle. Confused, she looked up, only for her entire world to be destroyed in under a second.

At first, she didn't believe it. She couldn't. It wasn't true! Though as much as she screamed these things in her head, it didn't change what she saw.

Falling from the roof of the building they had just spoken on was her sister. It all happened so slowly she could have been falling through water, and yet it was over in an instant. Sara fell, arms outstretched towards the sky before landing back first on a dumpster with a sickening crash, falling off that and onto the filthy floor of the alleyway they were in, her blood spilling out onto the ground as her wig and mask fell off beside her.

A silent scream welled up in her mouth as she looked into the now dead eyes of her sister, Sara staring blankly back, an expression of shock on her face and three black arrows in her stomach. Laurel screamed out her sister's name and collapsed next to her, holding her in her arms and begging for this to be a dream, but the feeling of her sister's blood leaking out onto her hands from the arrow wounds told her this was all real. Tears streamed down her face as she screamed hysterically for this to not be true. It couldn't be, it just had to be some cruel joke, a nightmare, anything.

Though as much as she begged, she knew this was all true. Sara was dead.

From up above, another pair of eyes watched as Laurel mourned the death of her sister. The Prophet watched with a heavy heart as she mourned. He was tempted to go down and comfort her, but he knew how it would end. She would either run screaming away or accuse him of the murder. He knew that was how she'd react, as he'd been in the same position she had been once, mourning the death of loved ones. Of family. He knew he couldn't offer her anything right now, but even so, he offered Sara his respects. "Requiescat in pace."


End file.
